Word: haig
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...department, Haig has set a driving pace. He does not suffer fools gladly: he has been known to annotate papers with comments like "This is a lot of nonsense!" But he has won the respect of subordinates, as he has in all previous jobs, by hearing them out. Says one: "He listens, and the worst thing you can do is not give him a piece of information that he needs, even if it runs contrary to his own views...
Morale certainly has been helped by Haig's quick start in organizing the department. For the top jobs he has picked mostly moderate conservatives, men with long operating experience but little reputation for broad conceptual thinking. Some of the key names: Walter Stoessel, a senior ambassador in the Foreign Ser vice...
Secretary of State Alexander Haig took the lead in discussions about El Salvador after the new Administration was inaugurated. This was the place to try to halt Soviet adventurism, he argued. Some White House advisers-including top Aides James Baker and Edwin Meese-were initially reluctant to initiate a highly visible foreign policy thrust while the Administration was trying to focus attention on its economic program. But they succumbed to the argument, put by one top presidential aide: "You can't abdicate the conduct of foreign policy no matter what the domestic priorities...
...Reagan Administration immediately decided to scrap the Carter policy of linking aid to El Salvador to the elimination of human rights abuses and to progress on land reforms promised by the junta. Instead, another form of linkage was instituted: Reagan and Haig publicly emphasized that since Cuba and other Soviet clients were supporting the rebels, the guerrilla war in El Salvador was not a local affair but part of a larger East-West struggle...
...final decision was made at the highest level, with Haig and Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger actively involved. The plan: to station a limited number of American "trainers" in provincial garrisons with the Salvadoran military. They would be prevented from straying far from protected enclaves by what one top official called "the most strict operational guidelines that could be devised." An interagency group formulated the proposal in a decision memorandum; it was approved two weeks ago by the President at a meeting with...